Brian Kelly Talks Sunday's Florida State Game

Herbstreit to Harbaugh: "Be Like Notre Dame..."

 

Fast forward the video to the 8:20 mark...

Harrison Smith Moves to #2 With New Contract

The Minnesota Vikings just agreed to a $64,000,000 four-year contract extension with former Notre Dame Football team captain -- Harrison Smith!  Over the next eight months Harrison will be paid $22.5 million, the most ever for a safety in NFL history.

Harrison is now the 2nd highest paid former Notre Dame student-athlete of all-time!

Congrats Harrison!

Here's a look at the TOP 30 current and former Notre Dame athletes (football, basketball, baseball and hockey) who have been (and will be) paid the most as a professional athlete:

• Ronnie Stanley:  $136,145,183 -- not guaranteed, contract to 2025 
• Harrison Smith:  $127,666,546 -- not guaranteed, contract to 2026
  
• Jeff Samardzija:  $116,341,666
  
• Zack Martin:  $100,285,531 -- not guaranteed, contract to 2024 
• Jaylon Smith:  $75,095,997 -- not guaranteed, contract to 2025
  
• AJ Pollock:  $68,841,944 -- guaranteed contract to 2023
• Anders Lee:  $66,044,038 -- guaranteed contract to 2026
  
• Troy Murphy:  $66,000,000 
• Stephon Tuitt:  $64,760,551 -- not guaranteed, contract to 2022
• Kyle Rudolph:  $62,936,853 -- not guaranteed, contract to 2023
  
• Golden Tate:  $56,337,672 -- current free agent
• Brad Lidge:  $55,335,000
  
• Romeo Okwara:  $47,258,474 -- not guaranteed, contract to 2023
  
• Bryant Young:  $44,000,000
• Justin Tuck:  $43,248,463  
• Quenton Nelson:  $38,010,393 -- not guaranteed, contract to 2022 
• John Sullivan:  $35,800,027
• Jerome Bettis:  $35,122,500
• Jeff Faine:  $34,456,892 
• Will Fuller:  $34,243,347 -- not guaranteed, contract to 2022
  
• Kyle Palmieri:  $30,192,154 -- guaranteed contract to 2021
• Matt Carroll:  $29,537,032 
• Mike McGlinchey:  $29,481,766 -- not guaranteed, contract to 2023
  
• Tim Brown:  $28,432,686
• Laphonso Ellis:  $27,939,000
• Rocket Ismail:  $27,885,021
  
• Tyler Eifert:  $26,310,317
  
• Joe Montana:  $26,000,000 
• Ian Cole:  $25,949,694 -- guaranteed contract to 2021
• John Axford:  $25,306,209
  

LINK:  VIKINGS EXTEND CONTRACT WITH HARRISON SMITH!

 

Rocco Spindler Gives Award to His High School

Brian Kelly's Interview on "Race and Sports..."

Cubs Announce "Notre Dame Day" at Wrigley

It's the Friday (September 24th) before the Fighting Irish take on Wisconsin at Soldier Field. 

The first 2,000 fans who purchase a ticket to the game will receive a coupon that will give them the Notre Dame / Cubs hat for free.

The Cubs will be playing the St. Louis Cardinals that day.

LINK:  PURCHASE GAME TICKET AND GET FREE HAT

Notre Dame's Brian Polian w/ Media...

Notre Dame's "Milk Man" Mic'd Up!

Brian Kelly's Wednesday Media Session...

Dan Patrick Talks "Alliance & Notre Dame"

Watch Notre Dame's "Back to School Mass"

 

Because of the extreme heat conditions here on campus today -- the University of Notre Dame's Opening of the Academic Year Mass has been moved indoors to the Basilica of the Sacred Heart.

Mass will begin at 5:30 PM ET and can be watched LIVE at the video player above.

Will Conference Alliance Impact Notre Dame?

Here's a Yahoo! sports story about the alliance between the ACC, Big Ten and Pac 12 -- before today's announcement -- and how it might impact future scheduling for Notre Dame Football...

LINK:  STORY

Marcus Freeman & Defensive Players...

Ian Book's a TV Pitch Man for Quest Nutrition

NBC Interview of Domer Justin Tuck

OT: Ty Cobb Giving My Dad Hitting Tips...

 

(click on image to enlarge)

There was a photo on Twitter today of Ty Cobb giving hitting tips to Mickey Mantle -- see below...

Well, my Dad (Jim Small, Detroit Tigers center fielder) had the same experience with Ty Cobb -- just before my Dad headed to Lakeland, FL for Spring Training in 1957.  Here's the newspaper story from the San Francisco Examiner in February of 1957.

The folks at the San Francisco Examiner set up this interview / feature between Ty Cobb and my Dad, after his second season with the Detroit Tigers in 1956.  My Dad is one of the very few players in Major League Baseball history to jump straight from high school to the big leagues -- which he did in June of 1955 after his high school graduation from Bellarmine Prep (San Jose, CA).  He is 19 years-old in this photo with Cobb.

The photo on bottom left shows Ty splitting my Dad's hands apart on the bat -- which is how Cobb held the bat during his Hall of Fame career...

The coolest moment happened at the end of the day at Cobb's home -- when he went into a closet and pulled out a photo of his first day in a Tiger's uniform in 1905 -- and signed it and gave it to my Dad.

Here is Joe Theismann interviewing my Dad about his baseball career:

Ty Cobb giving a young Mickey Mantle hitting tips pic.twitter.com/3qmbEAjEbf

— Baseball In Pics (@baseballinpix) August 22, 2021

Notre Dame's Tommy Rees' Media Session

Notre Dame's Kyren Williams "Mic'd Up!"

Working On "Finishing Touches" to Golf Car...

I'm told we're getting closer to the arrival of the Notre Dame themed golf car...

The hold up has been "Tropical Storm Fred" which delayed the construction of the seats for the golf car (Lazy Life Seats + Covers -- Grovetown, GA) and the challenges in matching the color GOLD.  

Finding the right gold paint color -- is DIFFICULT!

I did take on the task of creating a few medallions (photo above) that could be used on the front grille and the steering wheel of the golf car.  Matt Leevy and Anthony Van Avermaete at Notre Dame's Idea Center were kind enough to knock out some Notre Dame Monograms out of acrylic for me -- then I took it from there.

Here's hoping we'll have wheels on the ground in South Bend before the Toledo game!

My First Trader Joe's Experience -- EVER!

Just traveled a couple of hundred yards from our home, to the grand opening of the Trader Joe's on the southern end of Eddy Street Commons...

I've been hearing about this store for years -- from my wife -- but, I had never stepped foot inside one, until today. IMPRESSED.

Prediction -- they are going to do very well here at Notre Dame!